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paternal.

Of or pertaining to one's father, his genes, his relatives, or his side of a family.

8 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/pəˈtɜː.nəl/Received-Pronunciation/pəˈtɜɹ.nəl/Canada, General-American/pəˈtɜː.nəl/Australia/pəˈtøː.nəl/New-Zealand
  1. Of or pertaining to one's father, his genes, his relatives, or his side of a family.

    paternal grandfather
  2. Of or pertaining to one's father, his genes, his relatives, or his side of a family. Fatherly; behaving as or characteristic of a father.

  3. Of or pertaining to one's father, his genes, his relatives, or his side of a family. Received or inherited from one's father.

  4. Of or pertaining to one's father, his genes, his relatives, or his side of a family. Acting as a father.

Where this word comes from

From Old French paternal (“of a father”) (12th c.), from Vulgar Latin paternālis (“paternal”), from Latin paternus (“of or pertaining to a father, paternal”), from pater (“father”).

noun/pəˈtɜː.nəl/Received-Pronunciation/pəˈtɜɹ.nəl/Canada, General-American/pəˈtɜː.nəl/Australia/pəˈtøː.nəl/New-Zealand
  1. A person related through the father, or his side of the family; a paternal relative.

    rare
Where this word comes from

From Old French paternal (“of a father”) (12th c.), from Vulgar Latin paternālis (“paternal”), from Latin paternus (“of or pertaining to a father, paternal”), from pater (“father”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.